Routing has always been a critical aspect of data networking. Routing challenges evolves as data networks go through technological advances over the past several decades. One recent advance is the remarkable acceleration of the adoption of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). The Internet Society declared Jun. 6, 2012 to be the date for “World IPv6 Launch,” with participating major websites enabling IPv6 permanently. Wider deployment of IPv6 in data networks offers a new way for service providers to provide routing efficiency.
Also in the recent years, cloud computing through data networks has transformed the way applications are created and run. Cloud computing employs the Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) model in which customers outsource their computing and software capabilities to third party infrastructures and pay for the service usage on demand. Compared to the traditional computing model that uses dedicated, in-house infrastructures, cloud computing provides many advantages, including economies of scale, dynamic provisioning, and low capital expenditures.
The growth of cloud computing and IPv6 presents challenges to data networks. In a cloud computing environment, it is desirable to balance work load from customers across multiple servers, virtual machines (VMs), and other computing devices that spread multiple geographic and logic locations. Load balancing can make use of end computing resources more efficiently by avoiding overload and optimizing resource utilization. In addition, work load from customers uses significant bandwidth on data networks, and it is desirable to route traffic generated from cloud computing efficiently so that bandwidth, a precious resource on a data network, can be utilized properly so that throughput increases and response time is reduced. IPv6 offers new ways to address routing efficiency. Furthermore, mobile computing is now prevalent with ever enhancing computing power packaged in ever shrinking computing form factors. It is desirable for data networks to keep track of mobile computing devices so they can be utilized in load balancing and efficient routing.